Cracked Porcelain
by Synthetic Voice
Summary: Just an idea I got about the "jester" Prince of L.A.. I happened to be playing a Malkavian at the time, and thought, maybe there's more to LaCroix than meets the eye...take as you will.


"That will be all. Show him out." Shoes scuffing on expensive wood flooring were the only signs of protest as the Prince's Sheriff dragged the newborn vampire out of the audience room and back to the elevator. Sebastian LaCroix, Prince of the general L.A. area, rubbed one temple as he turned to his left, walking toward the door to his penthouse suite. It was far simpler to keep his receiving chamber within his home, though no one outside his closest confidants would know that.

These days, it was far simpler to keep things, well, simple, because the larger scheme of things had gotten far too complicated. The fledgling was proving to be more of a problem than he expected, what with its consorting with the Anarchs. The boy was useful in destroying his enemies, especially so against the Sabbat, but LaCroix wouldn't have all of his carefully laid plans destroyed because of a wild card.

The suite was small, and though LaCroix's tastes had changed over the centuries, basics were still important to the French soldier. No kitchen or bathroom was necessary, though he kept a small room with a bath and a shower available for hygiene's sake. What dominated the majority of the room was a king-sized bed, several large bookcases filled with leather-bound volumes, and a rather magnificent oak desk. However, none of this brought a smile to his face as he sat on one edge of the bed, closing his eyes for a moment as his dead flesh sank into the feather-soft cushion. A hand snaked out from under the comforter, making its way spider-like up his back to his neck, tracing nails lightly on the exposed skin.

"Hard day at the office, dear?" The voice connected to the hand was coquettish, and yet strangely childish. An arm, smooth and porcelain pale, emerged from the ruffled waters of the sheets, followed by a bare shoulder, all attached to a petite blond woman with different colored eyes. Though her voice implied merriment, her face was carved of stone, and her movements were sensual. LaCroix ignored her for a moment, his mind lost in the matter at hand.

"Is the young one causing trouble again, my Prince? If you like, stake him like you did my Primogen, or better yet, spike his head up as a warning to other encroachers," she continued, the French suiting the childish quality of her voice. LaCroix's face broke, showing annoyance as she moved closer to him, pressing her nude form to his back and bringing her hands to his chest, light breath playing against his neck. Was this his ordeal, to play Faust to this insane Mephistopheles? But, ah, it had been his bargain in the beginning – hadn't it? He could no longer keep his thoughts as straight as he once had. It seemed more and more things were slipping, but he was so close to achieving his plans; and then fate had thrown that _idiotic_ fledgling in his path, ruining everything.

"No, he isn't a problem – far from it. He is playing into my hands perfectly," he replied roughly, turning his face to hers and bringing their mouths within inches of each other. She smiled, and began to unbutton his shirt, pressing her hands to the pale flesh within. How long had he known her? When had he found her? His memories, his thoughts, they were lost…without her. He turned into her, bringing their mouths crushing together, but it wasn't her he lusted after. When did the dead have lust for flesh?

He pressed her back into the bed, separated by their clothes and the sheets, but his mouth, teeth, lips wandered away from hers, down that tilted chin, to the exposed neck. There, it was _there_, the thing he wanted, craved, _needed_. Without hesitation he bit down cleanly, the woman laughing aloud rather than crying out, her hips jutting upwards in reflex. He drank deeply, shuddering with each drop as it poured down his throat and into his belly, into his form, into his being, filling him as nothing else in his life ever had. He came _alive_ with the taste, the feeling electric throughout him. He was intoxicated, and who wouldn't be, those who drank of the children of Malkav? Insanity is truly a potent narcotic. It had warped his mind, became a crutch he could not live without.

With it came the thoughts he had barely entertained when he was alive – to be a ruler, in true right, like the great Napoleon. He knew what it took, what it required to become such a ruler, but the ruthlessness and bold moves of his politics did not come until later, much later, when he had visited the Dark Continent and returned with the man who would become his Sheriff. That was common knowledge, but what others did not know was that he had returned with two companions. And yet he wasn't even sure of her name, of her existence – was she simply a figment of his imagination, made up as an excuse for his actions, something he could fall back on in the event of his failure? Something his dignity and self-confidence would find acceptable?

But none of this mattered. The wheels were in motion, and the more he drank of power the more intoxicated, the more ensnared he became. She was always here in his apartments. Of her movements, he knew nothing – of her, he knew everything and nothing. Did he do these things for himself, or for her? Or was this simply…himself?

LaCroix did not know, nor did he care. He drank, pressing himself to her as she laughed and twined her arms and legs about him. When he was done, he fell at her side, spent and tired, falling into the waiting arms of sleep without another thought.

It was cold, unbearably so – it was something Napoleon hadn't planned for, these horrible Russian winters. The thinness of the clothing on his back and the coarse wool blanket wrapped around his shoulders did nothing for the biting wind, or the wetness soaking through his leather shoes. The soldiers huddled around their makeshift fires, little more than embers. They were all dying, ants in Napoleon's cause. Sebastian, however, had a mind to not die, to leave this idiotic cause, to tell people of the insanity that was their ruler, their government. As soon as it fell dark, he stole away into the woods, taking with him what little supplies he had managed to lay his hands on. From there, he had been on his own.

Fifteen minutes into his escape, it had begun to snow – this was both a blessing and a curse. The new fall would cover his footprints, preventing his commanding officers from finding the deserter, but it also made his movements slower and, in the end, might kill him all the same. That was when he found the cave. Without a second thought, he stumbled into its shelter, falling on his knees from the force of his movements. Still it was cold, but it was dry. Releasing his pack, he sat for a moment, fighting with the idea to go back out into the storm and finding some kindling – anything he found would be soaked through, and there was the chance he would never find his way back at all. As his thoughts were preoccupied, he didn't hear the footsteps behind him, until he felt the hands on his back, curling around his slim, small, muscled form.

"Having a difficult time, are we?" The voice was soft and playful, and the hands matched it, petite and porcelain pale. Yet it was though he was held by iron chains, and he was trapped. Instead of struggling, he stood completely still, trying to think of a way out of the situation.

"Thinking, thinking, always thinking. You might go far, in a world like mine," the voice continued, and lips pressed into the shaggy hair covering his neck. Suddenly he felt a sharp jab, a bite, and he cried out in pain. But the arms did not let him go – instead, his body performed the one act he had been trying to escape from. He died.

Then he felt a wetness, something sticky and copper-smelling, pressed to his mouth. His tongue pressed against it and then his mouth latched to the thing offering it, which was a limb, making the substance…but he was intoxicated, was possessed of the need to have this thing. He was dying, and this…thing was offering him life. His thoughts, the chances he had never had, to be something and someone – all of this and more being offered to him if he would just drink!

He fell to the cave floor, alone and dying. He would wake there the next night, reborn.

Sebastian woke in his penthouse suite, surrounded by the fruits of his long conquests. The books, varying from country and time period, the desk, filled with important paperwork, and the bed, the bed only fit for a… He rolled to the side, reaching.

He was alone. The bedspread was unmoved, not a crease to be found. Not even a smell and it was times like these where he questioned his own sanity. His hand smoothed down the place where she had been, feeling neither warmth nor cold, nothing but the smooth, clean press of the sheets that had recently been laundered. Laying his head back against the pillows, he began to think. There really wasn't anything standing in his way – the new fledgling would find the sarcophagus, and the antediluvian would be his. He would have the power he was always meant to have, and become the ruler he was always meant to be.

The sound of petite, pale porcelain hands sliding along the wall, glass nails tapping the door jam tunelessly in passing, gave voice to his thoughts as he slowly fell into torpor for the day.


End file.
